This is not a post about how Ancestry.com can facilitate the citation of sources.
This is not a post about how Ancestry.com could improve the “trees.”
This is not a post about how Ancestry.com could do things differently with DNA.
This is a post about how Ancestry.com could make it easier for me to use their site.
There are several references to estate records for Ulfert Behrens in Adams County, Illinois, in “Illinois, Wills and Probate Records, 1772-1999.” Knowing which one I have already looked or downloaded from the “results page” is not easy. The problem is compounded if the name is more common than this. It would enhance my use of the site if I had a way I could “tag” those records that I had already seen.
A simple “looked at it” column would be helpful.
It’s probably too difficult to implement.
But it would enhance my user experience.
3 Responses
I don’t know. YouTube can tell you if you’ve watched a video when you’re signed in, although I admittedly don’t know how long they retain that info. So it’s not impossible.
Like you say, this would probably be very difficult. The random nature of searches would require a huge amount of data to be retained for each user. Even if it could be done, it would probably involve cookies and Ancestry already puts way too many cookies on our computers as it is.
You could very well be right about the fact that it would require a large amount of data per user. Although I’m not certain it would require cookies as the data could be directly tied to our ancestry.com account. My real thought on this is that the ability to create such notations would cut down on the amount of time users spend “replowing” through information they’ve been through before…and that would mean less time spent on the Ancestry.com website 😉